Property, by Bess

Adding a Granny Flat

2010-01-05T21:09:00.000+11:00

If you have lots of space, or an unused shed in your backyard, you could consider a granny flat.

In one part of Sydney where we have an investment property, a studio granny flat can earn you up to $200 a week: a significant portion of the mortgage on a $250,000 block, and enough to make the property positive geared, when added to the $350p/w rent for the house alone.

In a tight job market (and an even tighter rental market) this, we considered, was insurance against the worst. At best, it would pay down the mortgage on the property faster, or the extra money coming from the flat would cover the cost of a loan to complete renovations on the house and increase the overall capital value of the property.

Remember, as a guide, that repayments on a $30,000 loan are about $50p/w so if you can do the build or the shed conversion for less than that, the other $150 p/w is just cream, especially if your property is already neutrally- or positively-geared.

Just remember that in some councils, even if there's a suitable shed on the property already (and fully plumbed), there may be regulations about distances from boundary fences. Penrith City Council in Sydney, Australia, has a regulation stating that a granny-flat may not be built within 3 metres of the back fence.

Unfortunately, our shed was less than a metre from the back fence, and there was only about four metres in front of it before the area we wanted to use as a courtyard garden for the flat met the back of our house. We didn't want to lose the courtyard as an entryway, or have the flat attached to our house!

This is not entirely the end of the world. The converted shed has potential to make a very nice studio or summer-house with the addition of glass doors along the garden side of the building. And, as the builder pointed out, as long as you don't put a full kitchen (i.e. a properly plumbed-in stove) into it, there's apparently nothing to stop the building being fitted out and rented out privately if a toaster-oven or microwave is an alternative...

Just a thought!

On picking the right mortgage product for your needs

2009-09-25T08:47:00.005+10:00

Consider this an object lesson in choosing your mortgages, folks. Make sure that you really DO know that you're going to be there long enough not to incur "deferred establishment fees" if you change banks early, and check what sort of legal and discharge fees they'll hit you with both within the first two or three years, and way down the track.

A couple of years ago, when I got on the road to financial freedom, all of this started with me at home, a new baby, a deposit (inherited from Grandma), our landlord wanting his house back, the (ongoing) Sydney Rental Crisis, Too Much Debt, and Not Enough Income To Be Given a Mortgage (TM).

So, we did what any sensible soul in our situation would do when faced with certain homelessness in the rental market, and teamed up with Dad, who agreed to hold the mortgage in his name for five years until hubby finished his apprenticeship, thus preserving the First Homeowners Grant (which I had a hunch would go up...) and allowing us to build up a "deposit" in the form of equity from work we did on the property.

I guess this is also a lesson in having better faith in my ability to get us out of trouble. I seem to recall saying at the time: "There's no way we're going to be ABLE to break this mortgage inside three years, so it doesn't matter.", thinking it would take five...

Well, this is it: We got to transfer stage in less than two!

Today, debt-free (momentarily, but this was important!), and with my parents about to move overseas forever, I'm about to walk into the local conveyancing office and make the swap. Just in time to take advantage of the First Home Owners Grant Boost of $14,000 before the end of September. We're also twelve months away (hopefully) from moving back up the mountains and turning this into Yet Another Investment Property... so we have to get the grant on this one now-ish (6 month rule) anyway, or we'll never get it at all!

Yep, it's been tight manouvreing into position for this one!

The plan is still to borrow 90% of the minimum estimated value, which, after paying out the original mortgage held by Dad, and coupled with the FHOG Boost should leave us enough to

a) clad, re-gutter and re-barge the outside of the house, and

b) fix the kitchen, which has been the bane of our lives for two years already.

c) thereby adding about another $20K to the value of the property.

And while trying to figure out/minimise my costs yesterday, we discovered that we're going to have approximately $5000 (or about 1 year's worth of our built-up equity) swiped by the bank in "discharge fees", legal fees, and most insulting and biggest of all "deferred establishment fees" on the loan.

Lucky we're going to make it for the full $14K boost, or there'd have been nothing left! After all, the last thing the bank wants is to have the outside fall off the house just after we purchase...

But anyway, my point is that no matter what, or how, you go about getting your hands on your first property, make sure you're careful about break costs and deferred punishment fees for paying out your mortgage early. After all, if you find yourselves unhappy with your original lender as we are, you're unlikely to want to screw the nuts down with them to get a better deal second time around: you'll just move on.

I'll keep you all posted on how things go today.

Choose wisely, and good luck!

And half the country breathes a sigh of relief...

2009-08-04T22:39:00.003+10:00

... as the RBA leaves interest rates at 3%.

This is a breather for all homeowners, but especially for First Homeowners who have come into the market on the back of the First Homeowners Grant, many of whom, it seems, have overstretched their budgets in the rush to get on the bandwagon.

But honestly, in an economic climate where thousands are losing their jobs, it would be foolhardy at best for the RBA to raise rates as the unemployment rate is rising. It would tip the banks back over the edge, in some cases, and screw the economy even further.

Why? Because more families would be forced into foreclosure, in spite of recent changes to bank foreclosure practices.

Let's hope they keep things this way for at least another six months - or until the labour market, which pays for these mortgages, recovers enough to sustain it.

UK and US markets should look to Australia

2009-07-15T12:13:00.003+10:00

I realised today that I've been very Australian-centric with my blog posts on here (with the exception of my comments about Kirsty Alsopp the other week), so figured it was high time to look further afield and start reading some of the OS news sites again.

What I read got me thinking.... the UK and US property markets would have a lot to learn from the Australian property market, which is one thing still propping us Aussies up, downunder in the midst of the financial crisis.

The UK market is having problems driving demand, and yet I know from research that you generally can't borrow more than five times your annual salary over there, which makes first homes average out at around GBP135,000 - far lower than the average here in Australia, even though the pound might as well be worth the same as the dollar in terms of prices (3 dollars or 3 quid for a cup of coffee).

Perhaps, to protect the building sector, they could look at providing more public housing in a tight rental market, as the Rudd Government is doing here. And perhaps they could boost interest in the market, building the Australian Dream into the UK Dream, by offering a similar scheme to the First Home Owners Grant.

The US may not need to offer such incentives to step into the market, given that it is massively oversupplied... but it could look at our banking system and make it so that mortgagees can't just walk away from properties that have gone backwards in value, as they have until now (and will continue to do into the future if nothing changes). This would, by default, prop up the market in the US for the future by making the American Dream home a less disposable asset.

Here in Australia, you're not allowed to walk away from your mortgage, scot-free... If the bank can't make the money back off the property, they can still come after you for the rest. Here, you're less likely to simply walk away and not return because your money and future really is tied up in your home. You'll stand and fight, and make more effort to keep it, especially with the rental rates running so high.

I realise that it's not going to be a catch-all solution. You can't solve a problem overnight. But it is food for thought. Perhaps the world needs to look at the best of each country's financial and mortgage system and cherry-pick until we find something that works?

We could learn a bit from them too (it could be argued...). Their interest rates are FAR better than ours!

Like travellers broadening their horizons... let's all learn from each other's strengths and weaknesses.

Now THAT's affordable housing...

2009-07-08T12:16:00.005+10:00

Oh wow. Had to post about this cool house in Melbourne. It only cost the young lass owning it $20K to build!

I don't know the land value, but that's got to be positive cashflow.

Sassy, smart girl! I'll leave you to read the article for more info.

Something screwy at the Land Titles office?

2009-06-17T15:41:00.002+10:00

Turns out there might be, in the case of our place.

Not satisfied with repeated deliveries of our mail to the block of 18 villas next door, and having every Tom, Dick, Harry, Auto-electrician and Foxtel installer (not to mention the cops and the odd debt collector as well), show up at our front door, hubby has taken the chance to complain to our local councillor when she showed up at our place to ask if there was anything she could do to help.

Well, she's managed to fix the signage problem on Block A, but it probably won't stop the neighbours giving their addresses without either the A suffix, or the unit number. Hey ho...

But checking the council maps on their computers shows another potential problem anyway: Our block is listed as A, and theirs as the number alone. Not the case on the title deeds, but confusing enough to make a case either for the renumbering of our street, or at least to make sure that the numbering mis-match doesn't occur at the Land Titles Office as well!

Will keep you posted, as it could be interesting if it turns out we bought a block of 18 villas instead of a beaten-up old house thanks to a mis-numbering on the deeds or the records!

Can anyone enlighten me on what the ramifications might be?

Our Kirsty's being censored!

2009-06-06T21:21:00.003+10:00

I confess, I'm a bit of a fan of Kirsty Allsopp.

She's probably got a lot to do with why I write this blog, run my business, and maintain my property web site. Her, a design degree, a nasty situation in the Sydney rental property market, and the fact that I watch way too much of the Lifestyle Channel when I am stuck at home with our daughter.

Oh, and being nuts about investment property :)

And, frankly, why shouldn't she be allowed to express herself with some of the clients she gets? I know I've said "Christ Almighty!" and worse (although probably out of earshot) with some of my own! "Shoot me now!" is a bit of a favourite...

Anyway, poor Kirsty, favourite presenter of the UK's Relocation Relocation, has been asked to keep a lid on it for the camera!

I hope they give her a punching bag off screen to make up for it...

Housing and the disappearing Australian Backyard

2009-05-08T12:16:00.004+10:00

It's sad really, but this article in today's SMH shows a scary trend towards huge houses with little or no backyard.

I'm an advocate of the suburban back garden for landlords with family tenants. It's about keeping up the quality of life for yourself as a home-dweller, or the people whose homes you are responsible for... Giving them space to entertain outside if they wish, or to play in the backyard means you have happy tenants who stay in your property longer. At least that's the theory...

But it seems in the rush to sell bigger houses to home buyers in newer suburbs, builders are selling their buyers short for pointless "activity rooms" and the kids are locking themselves in their rooms to play computer games, while all the while our population gets fatter and less fit.

There should be a regulation in Australia. There needs to be a garden space of at least 75 square metres on every property being built and to hell with the builders and what they want to sell us.

I won't let my little daughter spend hours in front of the television as she gets older. Even now, at two, she comes out to play on her trike or her cubby/slide, or in her sandpit while I put out the washing. Or she runs around the garden while I throw a ball for her, and she comes with her Daddy and me to play frisbee for even 20 minutes down the road most weekends. I include her. I let her "help" with the gardening as we spruce up our battered old house, and look at flowers and insects with me, showing her carefully every little thing of interest that I find.

I was never much of an outdoors kid in the sporty sense... although Dad instilled in me a great interest in nature and we were always out together on weekends while Mum did her concerts. it's not really about being sporty. It's about getting out in the fresh air and taking an interest in things.

I've digressed a little from the property side of things into parenting, but it's made a difference in my life and the type of property I live in is really important to me as a result.

Dear readers, tenant or landlord: PLEASE give yourselves space to enjoy the outdoors! With places away from home being less safe for kids to roam, they're even more important now than they ever were in the past!

Bricks and Slaughter for First Home Buyers? My arse...

2009-04-24T16:05:00.002+10:00

Maybe I am a little biased as both an investor and a first home buyer, but Jessica Irvine's comments in the Sydney Morning Herald Yesterday really made my blood boil.

"Last time I checked, a mortgage holder with a $300,000 mortgage pays $1400 a month in interest payments straight to the pockets of those same banking chiefs we all say we despise. Hate them, but you're paying their salary."

This, among other things, was part of an attack on Mr Rudd's government for encouraging activity in an otherwise flat/receding economy by helping First Home Buyers to get into the market with the First Home Owners Grant Boost.

Let me tell you something, Ms Irvine: If we had not made the decision to take the plunge and buy, we wouldn't even have a roof over our heads. Not for $1400 per month. Not for any money (that we didn't have at that point anyway).

Rents had skyrocketed so high in the three years since we leased our last property that we simply could not afford to rent a property to house our family and our home businesses. Nor, with me out of work at that point, could we even persuade a landlord to give us a lease. With a five-month-old and my husband just started a new job on a new career-path, we were considered too much of a risk!

I would much prefer to pay $1400 per month for a suitable property in a slightly crappier suburb, than the $2000 per month we would have had to find (and our peers have had to find) by staying in the rental market.

For a start, it now officially costs less to be buying than renting for us. We can also do as we please with the property and tailor it to our needs. The renovations have reaped us several rewards, including an increase in property equity and the ability to leverage it into an investment property. And now that we have lived in it for more than six months, whenever we are ready we can move on and keep this one as an investment property on a rental return that will see it positively geared.

So sure, some prices may have gone up in the Sydney market, but it's certainly reinvigorated the dead and receding market in Western Sydney, and provided some, like us, with the fantastic opportunity to secure their financial futures!

So the banks really are ripping us blind!

2009-04-21T16:08:00.002+10:00

Here it is, in writing (as if we didn't know it already). The banks are crying poor and refusing to pass on the rate cuts, all the while, raking in the extra profits from the poor suckers who fixed their rates at the height of the interest rate mess.

Yes, their profit margin has gone from 0.8% to 0.95% in the last year alone.

So guys, what's the problem? An extra 0.15% not good enough for you?

Yeesh!

Insurance Tips for Multiple Properties

2009-02-17T15:06:00.001+11:00

Great tip (summarised) from the Australian "Property Investor of the Year" Conny Torney (Your Investment Property Magazine, Feb 2009):

If you have more than one investment property, shop around and spread your landlords insurance policies across multiple insurers. This is because you may run into difficulties getting insurance later on, by having too many small claims with the one provider.

Nice one!

2009-02-03T12:26:00.003+11:00

Wow, it's been a little while, but I'll tell you why:

I've been working on two new web sites to help out my readers in their investing efforts, and the work over Christmas has paid off.

I received my new business cards today, and by the end of the week, Property By Bess.com , my new consultancy, will be launched! So if you live in Sydney, and you need someone to look over your property (whether you be an investor or an owner-occupier who needs to sell for a better price), give me a call. I have several levels of report that you can order, tailored to your property style and needs. Last year, I got one of my clients a 60% rise in the rental return on her investment property! Can't guarantee that for everyone, but that's phenomenal, and it wasn't a particularly difficult job, either.

Another one to add to your bookmarks page is my much bigger site: Investing in Property Rentals. Very much a work in progress, this will take the more serious aspects of investing in rental property and look at them in depth, providing you with both information, and eventually access to providers who can help you in all aspects of your investing endeavours.

Stay tuned for an exciting year!

"Look to your credit cards..."

2008-12-09T16:52:00.003+11:00

"Simple!" everyone says when I say this to them. "I've eradicated my credit card debts. My cards are clear."

That's all well and good, but if you're trying to get a home loan, the banks don't so much care about whether you have any credit card debt, as how much your credit limit is. Yep, that's right!

A friend often proudly announces he used to be able to buy property in WA without breaking the limit on his cards. But these days that is not so easy. And so many people think that just because they don't have any debt on their cards, they should still be able to get a loan.

Unfortunately, the banks regard the credit limit on your cards as a major liability. So there might be nothing on them now, but there's no guarantee that your $20,000 limit won't be blown in one big spending spree. And they can check this with the credit reporting agencies as well. So before you go and get another CRA hit on your card applying for another loan, look to your credit cards again.

It's worth phoning your bank and asking for a reduction in your credit limit to as low as you can get it while applying for a home loan. Dropping everything to $500, even for a few weeks while you get the loan sorted out, should be sufficient to make sure you get over the line in some cases (of course, it's not always the reason they won't lend to you, but that's another story for another day!).

There's no reason why you can't get most - or all - of your card limits back later.

If you really want them that way...

Research and research again

2008-10-24T09:08:00.005+11:00

Whether it's your home or your investment property, research is key to making a good buy and there are lots of ways to find out if you are paying above, right on, or below market value.

Don't be fooled by cosmetics in a house - if it's the best house on the worst street in your chosen suburb, it's got a huge chance of not being worth what you are paying for, and in some places, a greater chance of being damaged by the locals.

Remember the rule: it should be the worst house on the best street. That way, if you're not afraid to get your hands dirty (and for some reason, so many people are these days!), and of course if the house is sound (unless you plan to knock it down), you have the chance to value add.

For those wanting to find out more about values in the area they're looking, and avoid a rip-off, here's a great article on places you can look: Less Emotion Better Value

Again, it's Australia-centric, but it should give you ideas for where to look in your own country as well!

Help for the needy.

2008-09-12T16:41:00.003+10:00

You might think that people who own there own home aren't really needy, but the Credit Crunch, inflation, fuel costs and the SubPrime crisis in the USA have had a worldwide effect on household budgets.

Thankfully, there's a little-known secret for Australians who are finding it difficult to keep up their repayments on their homes in these times of rising interest rates (yes, I know they came down last month, but that's the first in a long time, and many of you are still hurting from the last rises!).

So, here's making sure that as many people know about it as possible: The Mortgage Assistance Scheme is a loan of up to $20,000 from the government, designed to be zero-interest and to be paid back at a later date when the situation improves. You have to be able to prove that you've tried every other avenue to keep your house, but already there are over 680 people using it, and it is making a difference.

The other benefit of moving the bins...

2008-09-11T15:56:00.000+10:00

It might just put another 17 metres between most of the cockroaches an us!

Joint Venture - creative investing

2008-09-11T15:45:00.004+10:00

I read a brilliant article in this month's Australian Property Investor magazine this week...

The investor in the case study had built a $23M portfolio, not by buying and selling, or renovating... he'd done some of that, of course, but the majority of his money came from joint ventures with people who had big properties.

In this market (which is a buyer's market, and house values are declining), you will probably come across a few people who have to sell, but who are sitting on big properties. Subdividable properties, if you look in the right places...

So this guy goes up to the owners, and offers to put in the money to subdivide the property (which generally doesn't cost as much as buying them and holding them, let alone holding them while you organise the subdivision!). The deal is they "donate" the property for subdivision, and once the property is divided, expenses taken out and sold off, the profit is split 50/50.

Not a bad way to make a buck if you can pull it off!

What not to buy - solving the Part 1 problem

2008-09-02T15:19:00.003+10:00

A few weeks ago, I complained bitterly that the tenants of the property next door were leaving their bins out the front of our house for a week at a time, knocking them down, spilling stuff everywhere and generally making a nuisance of themselves.

Now, we think we're found a solution to the problem: the first stage has so far begun (slowly) to have an effect.

We keep putting their bins in the middle of the driveway, so they're having to move them and they're starting to get the message.

Going to the next level takes a bit more effort and a bit of money too, but if your council is okay with the idea, they may thank you for beautifying the street while you're at it...

What am I talking about? We have an automated garbage truck that picks up bins on a huge arm, so they need to be left on the edge of the kerb every week. If you're not averse to a bit of extra garden space, and the council isn't either, plant a garden on your nature strip by the kerb where the bins go!

This is now on our "to-do" list for the future (because we're really darned busy doing other things to our property at the moment!), but basically, a good sized tree to grow up and shade the street will add to the ambience and property values in the area (up to 30%, in fact, over the long-term!). Add some beds and plants around it (leave enough space for, say your one or two weekly bins to sit), and you're not only beautifying the street - you're stopping the tenants next door making the front of your property look like a garbage dump week-in, week-out.

Remember that, just like the grass you already have there, it's actually your responsibility to maintain the garden beds out the front of your property, so be prepared for the extra work that that entails (or ensure it's a really easy-care bed!).

But there you go: Problem solved, value added!

The boundary minefield - Replacing Fences

2008-08-25T14:14:00.000+10:00

When it comes time to replace a fence, at least in Australia, there's a very clear-cut law that says owners of the property either side of that fence are jointly responsible for the cost of its replacement.

If you want to see the whole thing, go to the Department Of Land's Dividing Fences Act 1991

There's no getting out of it - if the fence is falling down and one party decides enough is enough, the other party has to pay for half of a basic replacement fence (in this case, either timber - nearly unheard of these days - or Colourbond steel, which is cheaper and more bushfire-proof). If you want something more expensive and the neigbours don't agree, you have to pay the difference between the cost of a basic fence and the swanky one.

It doesn't matter if the owner is a landlord, owner occupier, or even a Mortgagee... they still have to pay.

(Note that in the UK and the USA or elsewhere, the laws may be different - in the UK, the different sides of a fence are designated as being the responsibility of a particular property, the idea being, I think that you are only actuall responsible for maintenance of one single section of fence)

This doesn't mean, of course, that you won't have problems.

When we bought our house nine months ago, the property next door was owned by the same bloke who sold us our place. As a landlord, he'd never bothered to replace the fence between his two properties because he didn't care that they were hanging off their posts at and angle of 45 degrees, letting large dogs from one yard into the next to maul the neighbour's children... you get the picture? This guy was so lazy that when the house next door took too long to sell, he let the bank take it off him and sell it for a song and, of course, continued until then to ignore our requests for him to help fix the problem.

Thankfully the neighbours no longer had the big dog... we have a toddler!

When the house sold, however, we had a new owner who spent time and care doing the place up and was enthusiastic to replace the crappy fence. The big hold-up at that point was that the house behind (two sides actually needed replacing) was also a mortgagee reposession, and the bank was flatly refusing to take any part in the expense. You'd think they would have had more sense.

This can be a real holdup to a project if you don't quite have all you need to do the job yourself. Of course, you can do the lot and take them to court, and they'll lose, but how can you make them pay costs?

One genius friend of ours who had seen this before finally told us to slap a legal caveat on the property behind us. No-one could buy the house there unless they agreed to pay for their half of the fence!

Of course, this didn't solve the immediate problem of the cost of getting the thing replaced, but it *did* make the bank's life very difficult because it makes the property doubly hard to sell. The caveat has to be presented with any contract of sale!

We'll see how long it takes them to cave...

Tenants, Rental Arrears and Bond

2008-08-18T19:57:00.002+10:00

Okay, it's time to get a bit more serious. No more frivolous posts about whacky solutions to common irritating housing problems (at least for now!)

It's easy to get caught up in the excitement of the actual purchase when you're buying your first investment property, but this is the time when you should be completely on your guard. If you're a first home buyer, it's also important to note things like this. I've made this mistake once, and so has a friend buying her investment - all within six months of each other!

If the property is tenanted, you need to be mindful of a few things:

1. Ask the agent if the tenant has their rent up to date. If they are hedgy about telling you, make it a condition of the contract that you find out before the purchase goes ahead. You have two ways to go with this: if the property is to be leased, you have good reason to request vacant possession. The tenants are not worth keeping if they won't pay their rent. It's also important in the case of the following...

2. Ensure that all paperwork relating to the tenancy is held by the agent, as well as a second set of keys. Again, if they are hedgy about it, make it a condition of the purchase contract that you see the lease, and get a copy of the incoming inspection report.

We made the mistake of not checking these things when we bought our first home. We naturally required vacant possession, but we didn't realise that they were in arrears on rent. What we also didn't realise was that their bond, all its related paperwork, and the inspection reports were all missing because they had taken out the lease with a previous, very dodgy agent who had done a runner with everything. We hadn't minded that the landlord waived the arrears rent in order to get them out early for us (our lease was up and we'd already given notice), but there was a catch:

With no paperwork to back us up, the tenants had left and not cleaned the house. There was rubbish hidden down the back of the garage and shed, and the carpets had not been vacuumed, let alone washed. It was a cleaning nightmare. In Australia, you're expected to wash down the walls as well, when you vacate. In this case it took me three buckets of water to clean the walls in each room... Of course, when we went back to the agent to discuss the bond, they couldn't do anything. This was the condition the house had been handed to them in (tenanted), and they had nothing to back them up or even to retrieve the bond.

3. Whether you are buying to live in a house, or buying to let it out, and the tenants are going, make it a condition of the contract that the bond comes to you for cleaning if the state of the house doesn't match the inspection report they came in on. This puts the onus on the landlord to make sure the house is clean, and effectively gives you a discount off the price that can save you the costs of cleaners, or even debris removal if the tenants have trashed the place.

This applies equally in the case of the tenants being in arrears on their rent. Under normal circumstances, their bond returns to the vendor if the tenants are in arrears. This leaves you with a gaping hole in your budget (especially if you're renovating before you re-let the property, or after you've spent your last pennies on the move and the paint to freshen the place up) when you have to spend a week cleaning, or paying $500 for a one-off full-house clean by professionals, or, indeed, hiring skips!

In the case of the friend's investment property (where I project managed the renovation), time was wasted and costs raised immensely because the tenants were both in arrears, and they trashed the place. We had to clean, hire skips, replace damaged doors (because they were annoyed at being evicted...but we could see before we bought that they were trouble and had to go.). The lot!

Avoid the trap, and check your facts.

On the problem of people parking across driveways...

2008-08-17T20:50:00.003+10:00

Got an issue with people parking in front of your driveway?

An old friend and flatmate (when we lived in Manly, which is one big parking issue in itself...) had a solution:

Y'see, when he complained to the police about it (thinking, as you do, that parking across people's driveways is illegal), he found that, actually, in the State of NSW, it isn't. People can block your driveway as much as they like.

Rude though it is...

Just gently let their tyres down for them. No need to use a knife. Just make it inconvenient for them to get the tyres pumped up again. Do it as frequently as you need to.

They'll stop.

And the police won't complain. They think the law in this case is dumb too.

What to do about the last post...

2008-08-15T19:03:00.001+10:00

Of course our new solution, at least to tackling the bins-in-front-of-house problem, is to get a big broom, and pile all the bins and their disgorged garbage in the middle of their driveway. Maybe then they'll go pick on the house on the other side. :)

What not to buy: Part 1

2008-08-14T20:02:00.000+10:00

I've just figured it out. I will never buy next to a block of apartments again...

Two reasons:

THE BINS: 20+ bins every week don't fit along the front of their property, so they wind up spilling over into the front of your property... and then they get left there long after collection day. They also get knocked over by the garbage truck, or by the hoons driving out of their apartment block, and the filth left all over the nature strip, driveway... gross...

and also

THE BINS: This is where it really hit me. If you're in a cockroach-prone area (and most people aren't lucky enough not to be...) they are attracted to the 20+ bins etc... And then they come into your house...

And that's if the hoons in their hotted-up cars aren't enough for you.